The Truth Between the Lies
by Ayiana2
Summary: How close can Booth get to Pelant's line in the sand without crossing over? How do you balance five innocent lives against your entire world? Spoilers for 8x24.


Booth had taken walks down death row that had been friendlier than his current trek through the Jeffersonian. These were Bones's people, a fact that had rarely been clearer to him than it was now, nearly a week into their broken engagement and his demotion to persona non grata status. They were rallying behind their colleague and friend. That was a good thing, he told himself, she needed them right now. Still, he'd be glad to get back outside, into the sunlight and fresh air.

He found Angela in her office. She turned from her computer when he came in, but said nothing. Ignoring her glare, Booth handed her the folder he'd brought over from his office and managed not to roll his eyes when she accepted it as if it were toxic.

"What's this?" Her frosty tone wasn't unexpected. Still, it stung.

"Couple of loose ends I need tied up on a case," he said as she flipped open the folder.

"You could've just messengered it over." Her tone clearly implied that she would've preferred it if he had.

He shrugged. "I was coming anyway. Bones and I are going out to lunch."

Angela looked skeptical, but she merely pursed her lips and focused on the documents he'd brought.

Booth steeled himself against the temptation to call her out on her attitude. After all, she wasn't behaving any differently than anybody else was lately. Hell, even Cam was giving him the cold shoulder, and she'd been his friend since long before he'd ever met Bones. He wondered peevishly if even one of these so-called brilliant squints had paused to consider how out of character his actions were. Bones had always been the one to claim that marriage was just a piece of paper, not him. He was the conventional one. The religious one. Cam should've been asking questions. So should Angela, for that matter. And what about Sweets? Wasn't he supposed to understand actions and motives better than anybody? And hadn't Sweets been the one to warn Booth that Pelant might go postal if he learned about the engagement? But no. Instead of examining the evidence, everybody had circled their wagons and aimed their pointy spears right at him.

Angela interrupted his chain of thought when she closed the folder and tossed it on her desk. Her eyes were full of questions - questions he had no intention of answering.

"I'll take care of this," she said. "No problem."

"When?" he prodded, not caring that her eyes narrowed or that her hands landed on her hips in that just-who-do-you-think-you-are stance that never failed to make Hodgins cower.

"Soon," she said shortly. "I'll be in touch."

As he crossed to the door he felt her eyes boring into his spine.

He didn't look back.

* * *

Lunch was a quiet affair. Most meals were these days. In fact they'd barely talked at all since the night he'd broken off their engagement. Bones was polite but distant, and every time her eyes slid away from his a knife twisted in his gut. This wasn't the way it was supposed to be. It wasn't the way _they_ were supposed to be.

Damn Pelant, anyway.

* * *

On his way back to the office Booth caught a text from Angela. Just an address. No name. No phone number. No explanation. Whatever. Frankly, it was a relief to know that she wasn't so pissed at him that she wouldn't help him out. An address wasn't much, but it was something, and right now, he'd take whatever he could get.

Booth double checked the location and took the next exit.

Driving home from work that night he had the same argument with himself that he'd had every night for the past week. At first he would be determined to tell Bones the truth. They would just keep their engagement a secret until Pelant was dealt with once and for all. It wouldn't be hard. There were dozens of ways to tell her without Pelant finding out. He could deal with their friends' anger and disappointment as long as he had to, but he couldn't deal with her heartbreak, especially when he'd caused it. And especially when it was born of a lie.

So he would tell her.

Decision made, the next five miles passed in a relieved daze.

Then he sighed.

What if Pelant did figure it out? Hell, what if he only suspected? Then what? People would start dying, that's what, and it would be Booth's fault. Could he live with that? And what about Bones? Did he have the right to ask her to shoulder that kind of responsibility and the guilt that would come with it? Hell, he couldn't even give her a choice in the matter. He either put her in that position or he didn't.

And what if Pelant wasn't satisfied with killing off random strangers? Not that that wasn't bad enough, but what if he went after the people Booth loved? Was he willing to put Cam's life on the line? Or Angela's? Or Hodgins'? Or … God forbid … Cristine's? What if he went after Bones? What then?

"You won't marry her," Pelant had said. And he'd been so fucking sure of himself, too.

Booth shuddered. No. He wouldn't risk anybody else's life for the sake of his own happiness. And he couldn't do it for hers, either. He'd just have to pray that she loved him enough to hang in there until he could get this mess sorted out, and then, afterwards, that she would forgive him. In the meantime, the best he could do was let her know that he loved her, that he was there for her, and that he wasn't going anywhere. No matter what.

The house was dark and silent, but Bones had left a message on the answering machine. In a cool, detached voice she informed him that she was working late, that Christine was with Max, and that he shouldn't wait up for her. She would pick up Christine on her way home, and they'd both see him in the morning.

Ignoring her directive, Booth got a beer from the fridge, turned on ESPN, and settled in to wait. He wasn't going to bed without so much as laying eyes on his girls. Not tonight. Not any night. Not ever again.

The sound of the key in the lock brought Booth to his feet an hour later. Bones came in with Christine cradled against one shoulder and assorted bags slung over the other. He moved to help, pretending not to see the quelling look Bones flashed his way as she kicked the door closed. They were both doing a lot of pretending lately. Sweets would call it coping. Booth just called it maddening. Still, when he reached for the baby, he played his own part in the game by pretending not to notice that Bones's grip tightened, just for an instant, before letting go.

"Hey," she said, with a smile that didn't reach her eyes. "I thought you'd be asleep."

Hoped, more likely. Booth shook his head. "I wasn't tired." Christine nuzzled into his neck. She still smelled of last night's bath. "I'll put her to bed," Booth said. "Be right back."

Bones handed him the diaper bag. "If you need me I'll be in the office. I've got some work to finish up."

At almost midnight? Just how much worse were things going to get? But he only nodded and turned toward the stairs.

By the time he came back down Bones had settled in at the computer. Her fingers flew across the keyboard as she chased some random piece of information down a virtual rabbit hole. Booth leaned against the doorjamb and studied her. She was pale. There were dark shadows under her eyes. And she was pretending not to know that he was watching her. The sight of her, so tired and so alone, solidified Booth's resolve. Enough was enough. They'd both worked too long and too hard making things right between them. There was no way in hell Booth was going to let Pelant ruin it all. So fine. Booth would abide by the letter of Pelant's "law." He'd already broken the engagement, and he wasn't going to tell Bones why. But if, in the course of casual conversation, she took one of those brilliant intellectual leaps she was so famous for, that wasn't Booth's fault, was it?

Just then, Bones looked up from her work, faint irritation in her gaze. "I'm busy here, Booth. Did you need something?"

You, he almost said, but instead of answering he crossed to her side and lifted her hands from the keyboard. Then he reached for the mouse. Two clicks set music playing. That done, he tugged the power cord out of the cable modem, watching its blinking lights fade to black while he pulled a small device out of his pocket. He connected it, turned it on, and hoped like hell that the man he'd bought it from, a shady character with too much hair and too many tattoos, had been right when he'd said that it would block every signal coming out of this room.

"What are you doing?" Her tone was half puzzled, half annoyed. "I was working."

"Just give me two minutes," he said.

Without waiting for an answer he pulled her up and into his arms. Her body was stiff and unyielding, and trying to dance with her was like trying to dance with a sheet of plywood. He couldn't help comparing the experience to the first time they'd danced together-in a rundown bar on the Flathead Indian Reservation almost three thousand miles away. She'd been light on her feet that night, her eyes flashing with amusement at his suggestion that other men were hitting on her. Their lives had been so much simpler then. Sure she'd had walls around her heart that would've put any maximum security prison to shame, and there'd been times when he'd wanted to throttle her, but damned if even then he hadn't felt that spark between them, that sense that maybe, just maybe, they could build something special together.

And they had built something special. They had a home, friends, a beautiful little girl ... Still, he'd been stunned speechless when she'd proposed. Sure, he'd teased her about marriage, insisted, even, that she be the one to pop the question, but when she'd actually done it he'd been caught flat-footed. She'd known it, too. It had been there in her eyes that day, the knowledge that she was taking him by surprise. But there'd been something else there as well-a hint of fear. In spite of everything they'd been through together, she hadn't been entirely sure that he would say yes.

Something Cam had once said to him floated to mind. "If you crack that shell," she'd said, "and you change your mind? She'll die of loneliness before she'll ever trust anyone ever again."

Well, he wasn't changing his mind. He never would. But Bones didn't know that. She couldn't know that. Not unless he found some way to tell her. Flooded with fresh determination, Booth splayed his fingers against Bones's spine and lowered his mouth to her ear.

"How many times," he asked quietly, "have I heard you tell one of your interns not to jump to conclusions?"

When she didn't answer, he repeated the question. "How many times, Bones? Ten? Fifty? A hundred?"

He felt her faint snort more than heard it. "Don't be absurd, Booth. If I have to repeat myself to an intern, they obviously aren't qualified for the job." The acerbic response was so purely Bones that he almost smiled.

"Okay, then. We'll ballpark it. Ten." She started to argue, but he spun her into a turn. "No," he said. "Shut up and listen to me."

When she gasped with indignation and tried to pull away he only tightened his hold. "Two minutes," he reminded her. "Three at the outside. Just give me that much."

He started her moving again because moving targets were harder to hit than stationary ones, whether you were aiming with a microphone, a video camera, or a sniper rifle. It was probably a stupid, simplistic way of thinking, but his military training declared it to be true, and that was good enough for him.

"It's all about the evidence, right?" He said, his mouth still close to her ear, his voice little more than a rumble in his chest. "You follow the evidence." He turned her again as the music swirled around them, the rise and fall of it adding, he hoped, one more impediment to whatever traps Pelant may have set. "We follow truth," he murmured. "It's what we do. What we've always done."

Her response was matter-of-fact, the mantra one he'd heard hundreds of times over the years. "Truth is all that matters."

"Right." He slowed their steps and waited until she lifted her head. Then he brought their joined hands to rest against his chest and locked his gaze on hers, willing her to see the hidden meaning in his words. "The truth is _all_ that matters."

He held his breath, waiting, and had to swallow a curse when all he got was a flash of bewilderment and tug of her fingers against his.

"Booth … This is silly. Let me go."

"No." Letting her go was the one thing he wouldn't do. Couldn't do. If only because his gut told him that if he didn't get this right, right here and right now, he might never get another chance. "Not yet." He took her into another turn. "Think, Bones. Use that brain of yours. What does the evidence tell you about me?"

"That you're a good man." Her voice had lost some of its irritation, but she was still clearly puzzled. "But I already knew that."

"What else?"

To his immense relief, her response came without hesitation. "That you love Christine and me."

The fact that she'd named their daughter before herself was telling, but Booth let it be.

"Right." Booth's pulse rate increased as he skirted ever closer to a truth he didn't dare speak, but he had to take one more chance, try one more time. "And when you love somebody, you do whatever you have to to keep them safe, right? Even if it's something totally out of character?" It was an oblique reference to her own decision to go on the run rather than risk their family's well-being to a justice system which, under Pelant's manipulation, couldn't be trusted. What he didn't know was whether she would get that and whether she would follow the train of thought on to its logical conclusion.

There was a brief moment's hesitation, and her response, when it came, lacked its usual conviction. "Yes," she said.

He had to tread carefully here. This could all go horribly, irrevocably wrong in an instant. Still, Booth couldn't help the intensity that crept into his tone. "I would do anything for you, Bones. _Anything_."

He sensed the instant the pieces fell into place. She stumbled. Not much, but enough that he felt the tremor of it against his arm, and her fingers twitched where they lay against his. Her head came up. Her eyes met his. Held. He willed her not to say anything that would give the game away to a dangerously omnipresent Pelant, because precautions notwithstanding, Booth knew he was taking a risk in saying as much as he already had.

It was worth it, though, because she abruptly softened in his arms. Her glance flashed to the device on the desk and back to him. And even as he watched, the hurt and self-doubt that had shadowed her eyes for days began to fade.

"You mean-"

He interrupted her with a kiss, and what at first was just a means of getting her to stop talking turned into so much more as her fingers tangled in his shirt and her body pressed into his. He closed his eyes and held her tight and let his lips say all the things his voice dared not-that he loved her, that he wanted her, and that, whatever the current circumstances might be there was nothing he wanted more than to spend the rest of his life with her.

When he started to draw back she clung, an unusual response for her and one that made his heart ache.

"It's okay," he murmured. "It's okay. I'm here." He let out his breath on a long, slow, sigh of relief. "I'm here. And I'm not going anywhere." He felt a shudder sweep through her and sent another silent curse winging Pelant's way. "I'm here, baby," he whispered. "I'm not going anywhere."

They held each other for a long time in the dimly lit room while the music he'd turned on earlier washed away what remained of the hurt. Then, silently, Booth reached over and turned off the signal jammer. Bones reconnected the modem, and they both stared at it as the lights flashed on, blinked, and then steadied.

"So." Booth spoke in normal tones, but he had to fight to hold back a grin as he yawned and stretched. "Will you be up late, then?"

Bones studied him for a moment, arms crossed over her chest and mischief in her eyes. "No." Her gaze slid down his body, then back up to meet his, sparking a predictable and inevitable response. "In fact, I'm pretty tired. I think I'll finish this in the morning."

With that she hit the button to shut down the computer, turned off the lamp, and reached for his outstretched hand, lacing her fingers through his. As they left the room, Booth felt a surge of triumph.

They really were going to be okay.


End file.
